United States: Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, has placed an immediate stop to all foreign assistance programs that received funding from the State Department or the US Agency for International Development (USAID) under the “America First” review by the Trump administration.
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The State Department issued a statement on Sunday that paralleled President Donald Trump’s Executive order to rethink foreign Aid distributions and reorganize programs.
The official statement read, “Consistent with President Trump’s Executive Order on Reevaluating and Realigning United States Foreign Aid, Secretary [Marco] Rubio has paused all U.S. foreign assistance funded by or through the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) for review,” Fox News reported.
Furthermore, “He is initiating a review of all foreign assistance programs to ensure they are efficient and consistent with US foreign policy under the America First agenda. President Trump stated clearly that the United States is no longer going to blindly dole out money with no return for the American people,” it added.
The statement continued saying that the reconsideration and alignment of foreign assistance on behalf of taxpayers is a “moral imperative.”
It further added that Rubio is proud to protect America’s investment “with a deliberate and judicious review” of how the money is spent on aiding foreign countries overseas, as Fox News reported.
What more are the officials stating?
“The implementation of this Executive Order and the Secretary’s direction furthers that mission,” the statement stated.
“As Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said, ‘Every dollar we spend, every program we fund, and every policy we pursue must be justified with the answer to three simple questions: Does it make America safer? Does it make America stronger? Does it make America more prosperous?'”
USAID staff members received a directive to cease global foreign aid distributions because defiance would trigger “disciplinary action,” according to the Trump administration.
As reported by Reuters, the Trump administration issued a firm memo to USAID’s 10,000-plus workforce, which stopped all foreign aid delivery worldwide, effective immediately on Friday.
According to the wire service memo, the requirements that employees needed to meet were established to assist Trump’s “America First” agenda.
Furthermore, “We have a responsibility to support the President in achieving his vision,” stated Ken Jackson, the assistant to the administrator for management and resources, who mentioned in the internal memo titled “Message and Expectation to the Workforce.”
“The President has given us a tremendous opportunity to transform the way we approach foreign assistance for decades to come,” the memo noted.